I'm gonna be uploading more works other than Colin for a while. I was given advice to bring more variety to my gallery, and so I shall.

I finally finished my birthday work. Though I find it strange that it's not in featured for some reason. Did I break any rules? Oh well, I'm glad I finished, hope you all enjoy it.

When you're working on art, find ways to make it easier on yourself. This hase been taking me a long time not just due to the sketch delay, the current living situation, and my horrible procrastination habits, but also because of my poor design decisions. As a result, it's my current birthday piece has been a task and a half. I apologize to all my fans who were patient enough to stay for so long, and the ones who were patient enough to still be around. I know you look forward to my work and I'm deeply sorry for the delays and my horrible procrastination. I hope you can forgive me and look forward to an amazing new piece.

God bless you all,

Colin Livana

I know it's taking longer than usual for me to post, but currently winter is upon us. Which means my mother is going to be working late and she's my only ride. As a result, my workflow has been greatly affected. Thank you all for your patience.

It's mah Birthday!!!

My birthday is only 6 days away, I'm very excited for that day to come!

Happy early Birthday to me! Now I'll be able to cut loose.

The Lands Between have a rich history since its inception. From the formation of the gods and their inception, to the shattering of the Elden Ring and how it affected the land itself. While we discussed the significance of the Greater Will and the Outer Gods, as well as their possible natures and actions, what happened during this great falling out of the gods within the Lands Between and Elden Ring itself? Well, while it may not be much to speak of, the little information we have helped to clear up a multitude of mysteries through logistic speculation. What happened during this time was none other than the God Hunts. More specifically, the God Hunts in their earliest stages and methods, when the Godskins were first conceived and exploring in ways to interfere with the meddling of the Outer Gods. While looked upon as possible villains, if we take a look at my first theory, context suggests they are actually in line with the Greater Will's authority and goals. However, there's a group that actively and openly claims they're the true purveyors of the Greater Will's authority, a group that was developed as society became more "sophisticated": The Golden Order. This is a well known organization within the Lands Between, as well as the game itself. These people claim to be within the Greater Will's good graces, and claim to be its champions. However, given the context within the game, in their actions and the Greater Will's design, the Golden Order is likely akin to the Catholic Church: a group of people who hijacked the teachings of the supreme power for their own selfish ends. But I can tell you're going to ask what brought me to these conclusions. Well, that's what we're going to discuss today: The significancies of the Golden Order and the Godskins, the earliest methods of the God Hunts, how the Godskins are the Greater Will's greatest allies, and how the Golden Order is actually reviled by it. Now, I should remind you that a lot of these findings are mostly logistic speculation based on the theories of others, but keep in mind these are rooted in as much logic as possible to provide the best answers. So please, don't take my word as absolute in this, but don't disregard it either. Lastly, I recommend you read the first part of my theory , as it will provide quite a bit of context for this one. With that said, let's begin our discussion.

To begin, let's talk about Queen Marika. I understand this is coming out of left field, but Marika is a most essential piece to this puzzle. The Queen Marika is a mysterious woman, with many a mystery surrounding her: where did she come from, who is she really, why is her face obscured throughout the game, why DID she destroy the Elden Ring? These questions and many more ring throughout the minds of the curious who seek to uncover the lore of the Lands Between. But one theorist, The Ashen Hollow, gave an interesting answer to who Marika REALLY is. While he didn't want to disprove whether Ranni or Malenia held this identity, he made too many good points that actively do just that, and presented a strong argument that Marika was the Empyrean known as the "Gloam-Eyed Queen". The Gloam-Eyed Queen was said to be the leader of the Godskins in their God Hunts, and utilized Destined Death as their primary tool for hunting the gods. However, she was assuredly defeated by the Golden Order at the hands of Maliketh the Black Blade, Marika's Shadowbound Beast. How could Marika be the Gloam-Eyed Queen and yet be hurt by one of her allies? Well, Shadowbound Beasts are essentially the servants of the Empyreans, who are created with similar traits as their masters, essentially a "shadow" of themselves as described by Smoughtown in his Shadowbound Beast video. But when their masters commit an egregious sin against the Greater Will, the Shadowbound Beast hunts their master. Given the series of events presented in Elden Ring, Maliketh likely started hounding Marika when she made the decision to shatter the Elden Ring, but as to why she did it will be discussed when we talk about the Golden Order. So, with that said, it is possible for Marika to be the Gloam-Eyed Queen in this context, and it would make sense for the Golden Order to twist history in a sense to where Marika and the Gloam-Eyed Queen were separate entities and tell history in a different light. The Ashen Hollow also speaks of other connections as to how Marika and the Gloam-Eyed Queen are one in the same. For instance, he speaks of how gloam is not necessarily referred to as a concept of night, but rather a concept of twilight, or dusk, and that it's more associated with the color purple. Given Ranni's eyes are more blue and associated with night rather than dusk or twilight, she can be ruled out as a candidate, as well as Malenia since her ties to the "scarlet" rot and the color orange are too strong to be associated with "dusk". But there is one appearance where a purple eye appears in-game: the beast eye Maliketh keeps on him. This eye has a purple color to it, and is somewhat colored in stone. Its item description states it has claw marks upon its surface, as this would indicate that it was violently plucked from its socket. The only other character amongst the cast who's face is not only constantly obscured, but is also stone AND missing an eye is Queen Marika herself. What's more, the Gloam-Eyed Queen was one of the earliest Empyreans, and Marika is the only other named Empyrean that we know that could come from that time. With this in mind, we can safely assume Marika is the Gloam-Eyed Queen, which also makes her the mother of the Godskins, as the Gloam-Eyed Queen personally "rears" them (they're artificially created) to raise them as godhunters. It's possible that the Albinaurics are the infantile stage of the Godskins, but more research would need to be done to make that connection, but since Marika is likely a human Empyrean and the Albinaurics WERE man-made, the possibility is still there. Not to mention, given the Nox want to mimic the Greater Will in order to counter it, it would be likely they'd mimic its servants as well, since they had to get the idea for their liquid silver homunculi from somewhere. However, while The Ashen Hollow makes the Gloam-Eyed Queen out to be the enemy of even the Greater Will, stating she disguised herself as harmless to get close to the Elden Ring, context indicates that the Greater Will came to the Gloam-Eyed Queen because she was a necessity to its goals. It is likely that, due to the falling out of the gods, that Marika started the God Hunts, and used more creative methods to hunt them and their venerators to extinction for their meddling in mortal affairs. The Greater Will likely saw how well they do their job and, needing a new generation of gods to uphold the natural order, as well as someone to protect the now vulnerable Elden Ring, made Marika, the Gloam-Eyed Queen, Empyrean and the keeper of the Elden Ring when it planted the Erdtree. As a result, the Greater Will gave Marika the ultimate god hunting tool: the black flames of Destined Death, which helped the God Hunts go into full swing. But then what DID the Godskins use as a means to hunt the gods before? Well, we'd have to talk about Smoughtown's dragon analysis again.

In his Elden Ring video on dragon lore, Smoughtown stated that life went through ages akin to what humans went through: stone>iron>bronze>etc. While he compares it too much to real life, he does make good points which help indicate the constant development of society as the gods fell and the God Hunts began. When the first god fell (likely the Formless Mother given her possible luciferian contexts with the blood red star and a grace mimicking tree in the afterlife giving off a red light), this is likely where the meddling began. As the gods fell overtime, likely with the third god, the first Godskins were possibly conceived, and began a more rough method of god hunting by killing off their worshippers and apostles, this is likely the aforementioned "iron age" of Elden Ring where old yet effective methods and tools were developed as mentioned by Smoughtown. Then, when the last of the gods fell (the dragon god), the God Hunts were picking up speed and strength around this time. This age of dragons were, as what Smoughtown would put it, the "bronze age" of the Lands Between, where the value of precious metals were recognized as indicated by the unalloyed gold jewelry and trappings buried with the bodies of their owners in Farum Azula. However, given the God Hunts were likely around at this time, the value of unalloyed gold was more than just its rarity and beauty. As stated in-game, and rediscovered by Miquella, brother of Malenia, unalloyed gold had properties that interfered with the meddling of the Outer Gods. Given the Greater Will's close associations with gold, unalloyed gold is likely considered something as incredibly pure and sacred, essentially the Greater Will's essence in its purest form. So pure and sacred in fact that it can interfere with those who rebel against it. Seeing this, the Godskins likely took this rare metal, and fashioned the first armor and weaponry that could hurt the gods (given the golden adornments found on their equipment), and used it to chase away the Outer God of Dragons and severely injure its most loyal servant. This is yet another reason why the Godskins would likely ally with the Greater Will, because without unalloyed gold being closely associated with the Greater Will, they couldn't have brought the God Hunts to the success it had at the time. Then, for a time, the Godskins helped to keep the peace and brought about a new golden age with Destined Death as their ultimate weapon. But then. . .society got "sophisticated", which is not always a good thing, it usually brings about an intense growth of hubris. This was most likely when the Golden Order started to develop.

The Golden Order, as we know them, is one of the more recent organizations that developed as society expanded and grew. It was supposedly an organization that claimed itself to be venerators of the Greater Will and its authority, but in contextual analysis, they were a tyrannical group of religious dogma. How the Golden Order came to be was that it was likely founded by Marika and the First Elden Lord, Godfrey. However, it is likely the order was founded by someone who gave Marika and Godfrey the idea to do so, and this particular person was given a strong leadership position within the order for the idea. Then, like how Constantine founded the Catholic Church, this POI (person of interest) started to take the original teachings and laws of the Greater Will, and began to twist them and add new laws and teachings that would solidify their power, starting with the removal of Destined Death from the Elden Ring. The reason as to why the Greater Will didn't interfere with this was this wasn't technically a violation of the natural order, as Destined Death wasn't destroyed, but removed, yet it was still quite the sin against it. Soon after came the tainting of unalloyed gold with the discovery and usage of gold alloys. To the Greater Will, this was most likely a symbolic beginning to the tainting of its authority by this Order. Eventually, they would convince people to worship the Erdtree as a god itself, even though the Erdtree as a temple, in all honesty, was easily replaceable by the Greater Will's design, since Miquella was allowed to take an Erdtree sapling and grow the Hiligtree without negative repercussions. Then came the discrimination of the crucible races, as well as the man-made races, from the grace of the Erdtree. You see, the Great One was, as confirmed by lore, the origin of all life. As the Erdtree was, by design, meant to feed off of the life force from the dead to power the Elden Beast, this was likely the Greater Will's way to returning all life to that sense of oneness and peace. The Golden Order likely knew of this and, in their arrogance, decided that only the pure were allowed this grace and peace, and began their campaign of discrimination. But, given the sheer size of the Erdtree, and that trees have longer roots than expected, its roots likely spread throughout the Lands Between and the Greater Will's grace was accessed by all. That's when the Golden Order resorted to their more cruel methods of hunting the discriminated and torturing them to death. As a result, they become wraiths in when they die in this tormented state, just as the ghostflame caused the torment of the soul as it burned from fire outside of destined death. As the Erdtree feeds off of peaceful life force, this not only successfully discriminates these beings in this life, but in the next as well, such as is the monstrous cruelty of the Golden Order. Keep in mind, all this talk of grace by the Golden Order is not the Greater Will's grace, since the Greater Will's grace is made available to all. As the Golden Order gained power through their machinations, they made it so THEY'RE the only ones who can define grace. This is not only highlighted with the basic logic as presented throughout this paragraph, but also by the player character. It is said that the tarnished, as said by the Golden Order of course, are those without grace, that they're disillusioned with the Greater Will's authority. Yet it was that same grace that brought our character back to the Lands Between and guided them to restore the Elden Ring. With all this in mind, it is a foregone conclusion that the Golden Order is incredibly dishonest. But how did the Golden Order managed to not get punished by the Greater Will, and why did Marika go along with this if she knew it was wrong? For this, we need to look into the history of both, side by side.

It is stated by Smoughtown that Marika came from another world. If this was the case, it would make sense for her to be easily tricked by the Golden Order. This is mainly because the two fingers were once a whole hand, as I briefly went over in my last theory. Not to mention it is likely these two hands (there are two canonical two fingers in game thus far) have been messengers of the Greater Will's commands since the dawn of Elden Ring's likely creation story, and were once understandable but as of recently need interpreters due to lost traditions. This is where the Finger Maidens (likely once known as Hand Maidens, it makes sense) come in, since they're the only ones thus far that can actually interpret the messages of the Greater Will from the hands. It is possible that, since the Golden Order now have access to Destined Death upon removal, and that the hands are individual entities from the Greater Will's body, weapons in hand they slew the Hand Maidens cut the thumb, index and middle fingers from the ring and pinky fingers. Why they chose this method against the Hands is interesting when you understand the implication of the fingers themselves. The ring and pinky fingers are known for holding, usually not known for doing much outside of matrimony and sophistication. The thumb, index and middle fingers are more known as fingers of action, they're known for helping us to grab things, to pick things up, to write, draw, scratch and eat. But more specifically, pointing, for when you point at someone with these fingers, you're implicating them of something, more specifically in the form of accusation. Given the implications of the Greater Will having heavy ties to fire, it was these three specific fingers of the Hands that had the ability to cast judgement by fire through the power of the Greater Will itself. The Golden Order more than likely did this with the intent of destroying these three fingers to ensure they get away with their schemes scot free, but while one was successfully killed (the three belonging to Ranni's two fingers), the other managed to escape to the north where the Fire Giants resided. But with both Hands purged of their ability to judge, they replaced the Hand Maidens with Finger Maidens to spin lies (with the exception of the one we meet in game who was likely once a Hand Maiden herself), making it easy to trick Marika into thinking the Greater Will wanted a change to the system. This was also likely where the Nox got the idea that the Greater Will could be killed and started utilizing the power of Destined Death themselves once Ranni stole half of it from Malekith. Once the Frenzied Flame prophecies began popping up with the walking dead, the Golden Order's grip of power was starting to slip, but thanks to the prophets they then knew the location of the three fingers, and had Marika declare war on the Fire Giants and their "God of Fire". As stated in my last theory, Marika more than likely brought Destined Death with her as a means to hunt this Fire God. Once she saw Destined Death wouldn't work on this Fire God, she would quickly realize this "Fire God" was the Greater Will, and soon started becoming disillusioned with the Golden Order. After Godfrey's divorce and banishment, Marika's Remarriage, and the Night of the Black Knives, Marika likely saw that the only way for this madness to end was to have the Greater Will itself to interfere, and the only way to do that was to disrupt the natural order. More than likely she confided this into her Shadowbound Beast, Malekith, but given his nature, and the likely fact he also bought into the Golden Order's propaganda and is more loyal to them than Marika, they had their big fight (essentially Maliketh's battle with the Gloam-Eyed Queen). Then, when Marika had her chance, she shattered the Elden Ring as Malekith came in for his final blow as she was punished by the Greater Will for her sin. As she wasn't obliterated on the spot, it's a definite outcome that the Greater Will saw the desperation in her act and allowed her to continue her duties under stricter conditions. Upon this revelation, years later, Malekith soon realized his mistakes, and asked Marika (metaphorically) if what he's doing is what it means to sin (the consumption of deathroot and the prevention of Destined Death's restoration to the natural order).

In conclusion, the significancies of the the Golden Order and the Godskins were likely not what we originally thought. The Godskins were quite resourceful before Destined Death was used as their weapon of choice, and that Marika was more than what she seemed. The machinations of the Golden Order were more cruel than we realized, and their actions sparked the further delusions of another faction. Lastly, Marika was willing to sacrifice everything she had and was for the sake of her children, loved ones, and those she sought to protect. So, that's my theory on Elden Ring, perhaps next time I should go into how Gold Mask's formula doesn't really work, but I don't see much of an analysis coming from that since it's just basic observation. Thank you so much for taking your time to read this, I hope you enjoyed my analysis of Elden Ring's lore, have a wonderful day.

Elden Ring, a game where you play as a character chosen by an entity called the Greater Will to restore order to the Lands Between. Along the way, you learn how the land came to be due to the selfish actions of many conflicting parties. Some view the Greater Will as cold, others project their ideals upon it, few see it as good. But the Greater Will isn't the only deity in play, there are those known as the Outer Gods who meddle on the affairs of mortals, and try to bring about their will above the Greater Will. But why are the gods at war in the Lands Between, why are people adamant in worshipping some of them in spite of their selfish nature, and why is it that the Greater Will is viewed as cold and distant when context clues point to it being more caring than it's portrayed? In this essay, I will talk about the Greater Will and the Outer Gods from Elden Ring, how context clues point to their true nature, and how they operated in the previous and current order of the Lands Between. To be clear, it'll mostly be based in speculation, but with logical conclusions and connections, so please don't take my word as absolute and instead take it as you will.

To begin, we'll talk about the Greater Will, it's position as a god, and how there's more to it than just fingers. The Greater Will is the creator of the Elden Ring, the supernatural mechanism that maintains order in the world of Elden Ring. Currently, the only things we actually know about it are that it communicates through its messengers "the fingers", it can appoint new gods, it can affect the nature of the world itself, and hearing from word of mouth that it's cold and distant. But this is official information from the game, context clues in and out of game indicate more. Lore in game states that life was once all united as something called the One Great. When the Greater Will created the Elden Ring and the Elden Beast, the One Great was shattered and from it sprang all life. From this, we can safely assume that the Greater Will is the supreme creator god in Elden Ring. As for the Outer Gods, they themselves were also created by the Greater Will, as well as the Fire Giants. To prove this, we have to look closely at what the Greater Will is most associated with: Fire! Since the creation of the Elden Ring, destined death was created as part of it, and is represented as a black and red flame. What's more, the incantation "Flame Protect Me" protects oneself from the black flames. As for the god of the Fire Giants, we can safely assume Marika used destined death in that battle, but is unable to kill it. Given the fact that a creation cannot destroy a creator, we should be absolutely certain that destined death cannot destroy the Greater Will, and will only work on other gods. This confirms that the Greater Will was the creator of the Fire Giants and further connects it to fire. What's more, the frenzied flame and the Fire Giant god are heavily implied to be one in the same, and uses fingers to communicate as well, and since "Flame Protect Me" is also a Fire Giant incantation, it further solidifies the Greater Will's connection to fire. But what cinches it is the mythology that likely inspired the Greater Will: Norse. From the context in my research, I deducted that the Greater Will is a combination of Yhimr and Odin. Yhimir is the creator giant in Norse mythology where life sprung forth from his body in all places, and we see the Greater Will uses body parts, likely its own, to create envoys (ie the fingers). Though a bit of a stretch, those fingers HAVE to come from somewhere, and the only logical being they could have come from is the Greater Will, and we can confer that from the Odin connection. The god of fire is said to be one-eyed, and that is not necessarily cyclopian. Odin himself had one eye, mainly because he plucked it from his socket and tossed it into the Well of Yhimir to gain omnipotence. If we're to assume the Greater Will is already omnipotent in Elden Ring, then what's with the one eye? Well, we can safely assume it used the eye to create the giants. They have an eye upon their stomachs that open and unleash the fire of their god when they sacrifice something of themselves as seen in the Fire Giant boss fight. It would certainly explain the one-eyed aspect and the Fire Giants' stomach eyes. There's also the fact the Erdtree is essentially akin to Yggdrasil, and fire is heavily associated with giants in norse mythology. Hence why the Greater Will is associated with fire. After all that, how does this connect the Outer Gods being creations of the Greater Will? Well, they're all associated with fire in one way or another:

God of Death: Ghostflame

Formless Mother: Bloodflame

God of Dragons: They breathe fire

God of Night and the Stars: Stars are born of fire.

God of Rot: Fire forestalls the scarlet rot. This will be explained later.

With all this, we can safely assume the Outer Gods were created by the Greater Will. But why are they called that in the first place? Well, because they were once loyal to the Greater Will. Smoughtown explains a lot about the Outer Gods throughout his videos, but as he spoke of the actions of the characters and the gods, I noticed that those who's actions were against the Greater Will caused great suffering, while those who's actions weren't against it we're a great help. This is one of a few things that disprove the Greater Will being cruel and cold. Another thing that disproves that notion is Ranni, who slew her flesh to prevent being controlled by the Greater Will. Like the devil, if she didn't have free will to begin with, she would have been unable to rebel, they both would be programmed only to perform their tasks and nothing else, never programmed to learn. Also, as the player character, we may have been called by the Greater Will to restore the Elden Ring, but we're allowed to do so however we can, and are left to live with the consequences. Not only that, but it could have obliterated Marika for destroying the Elden Ring, but given the context of the circumstances being of desperation rather than malice, Marika was spared and was allowed to continue her duties but under more strict conditions. How does this connect to the Outer Gods receiving their current moniker? Well, they committed acts outside the authority and design of the Greater Will, and thusly caused immense suffering as a result of their selfishness. It's also why none of them can be the new gods of the age, as Mhorgg, the Lord of Blood, needed a god of blood to usher in the Age of Blood, yet the Formless Mother isn't a viable candidate. As for how they ended up in this state, it's obvious they committed egregious sins that caused their descension. As to what these sins are, we need to look at their previous positions in godhood with the Greater Will, and what their duties were.

Let's first talk about the Outer God of Death, and the Outer God of Rot. The Outer God of Death is portrayed as a twin headed bird. In Smoughtown's video on the subject, he theorized that this god of death is also a god of war or rebirth, as Elden Ring's country of origin has a bird that symbolizes rebirth, and the warmongering text found in lore related items associated with this god, trying to make sense of the two heads aspect. However, given the fact that destined death has been a part of the natural order since the Elden Ring's conception, I can conclude that the heads represent the body and soul, given destined death is the passing of those two aspects. This also leads to the idea that this god of death adopted war into its portfolio once it fell from grace. As for the Outer God of Rot, context indicates that it was once a god of reincarnation, and worked alongside the god of death. This god takes a lot of inspiration from Shintoism, with the idea of rot being representative of stagnation, the lotus representing beauty born from the muck of impurity, imagery of scorpions, centipedes and butterflies all representing aspects of destruction, stagnation and transformation, etc. Context implies that this god is a scorpion, what with an in-game weapon being made from the stinger of this god, and the fact that it's inspiration is from the scorpion that can kill the Buddha from the myths of Sun Wukong (hence why the Scarlet Rot can also kill the gods in a metaphorical sense of the concept), further research leads me to believe this god of reincarnation was once a butterfly, since the butterfly imagery is more prominent than the scorpion. So, how do these two gods coincide while they were on duty? Simple: purification and reincarnation. YouTuber MetiNotTheBadGuy, while not an official source of cultural information, he does bring up a good point, brings up an interesting fact about purgatory in shinto as he spoke about Kyojirou, that it's a place where the fires burn away the impurities. If we look at the Scarlet Rot as the impurities of the world, the old process of reincarnation in Elden Ring becomes clear:

The god of death burns the body and soul of the one being reincarnated, removing the impurities gathered throughout their life.

Then using the ashes as compost of sorts, the god of reincarnation rebirths the person in question as a new, pure entity.

As to how they fell, they simply distorted the natural order. In Smoughtown's video on the deathbirds, he theorized the god of death helped to bring necromancy into the Lands Between by discovering the ghostflame, which is created by burning the bones of the dead. At first it would be obvious, since the body would be burnt along with the soul in the process, but this isn't black fire, this is regular fire. Upon the creation of the ghostflame came the wraiths, tormented spirits that lived beyond death, and can be controlled as a form of magic. This likely disturbed the Greater Will as this perverted the order of life and death and caused great torment to the suffering soul of the wraith. Thus, the god of death had its authority revoked. As for the god of reincarnation, it likely attempted to reincarnate someone before they were burned by the flames of destined death. As a result of the impurities remaining, what was reborn was an abomination, potentially the first servants of rot. And so, this god of reincarnation was also revoked of its station, and, still having the power to reincarnate the gods, reincarnated itself into the god of rot.

Next, the god of the Nox, their god of night and celestial bodies. In Elden Ring the stars and celestial bodies are said to tell of the fates of all, even the gods. It is likely this god of night was in charge of maintaining the movement of these celestials, and which was assigned to who. As for how they fell, we need only to look at the name of the race created to serve them, seeing as how the gods mostly had a designated race designed to their specified needs. Nox is the Roman name of the Greek goddess of night, Nyx, and is considered the mother of many gods in myth, and given the Nox utilize Greek architecture, she's a dead ringer for their god of night. This detail leads to the idea that the Nox worship a goddess which explains their more matriarchal system but back on topic. Nyx was known for birthing many gods associated with death, pain, suffering etc, and while this could explain stars like Astel in Elden Ring, it's not likely the god of the Nox was revoked for that. No, Nyx was well known as "the subduer of the gods", she was feared by even Zeus she was so powerful. This clicks with the Nox and their culture as they themselves have used the essence of stars to subjugate others under their will. It is likely they learned it from their god, as there's also a way to subjugate a god's fate in Elden Ring (though results are inconclusive given it's only done in the Ranni questline and she doesn't fall for it). This god of night was likely revoked for attempting to subjugate their fellow god, likely the Greater Will, with this method.

Next is the Formless Mother, who was likely a nature goddess at one point in time. The Formless Mother has heavy ties into Lovecraft, given the Age of Blood results in an Eldritch World of nightmarish horror. After thorough research, the best ties to this Outer God is a combination of the Black Goat of the Woods, and Yhidra. Very likely, this Formless Mother got a little too creative with nature, and used her blood to create something new. Like how an angel mating with a human woman created the abominations known as the nephilim, the blood of the Formless Mother was so incompatible with the creature it chose that it became the abomination known as the gluttonous serpent. This ties back into Yhidra as she devoured other entities herself to grow stronger, and like how the Black Goat's milk created abominations, the blood of the Formless Mother created the first abomination. So another god is revoked of their position.

Lastly, the god of dragons. The god of dragons and its lesser dragon kin were created by the Greater Will to serve as enforcers of its authority and upholders of the law. Smoughtown explains in his video on the dragons of Elden Ring that they're heavily associated with protection, and are shown shielding the world with their stone scales and golden wings in their symbolism. This could mean that the dragons and their god had the duty of upholding the authority of the Greater Will, and protected those who followed the law. However, like the others this god fell too and became an Outer God. Smoughtown further states that the god of dragons have significant ties to Tiamat, the mother goddess of mesopotamian myth, as he states that this dragon god and the dragons themselves have many ties to that myth. At first I thought that it was unlikely that any of the dragons rebelled against their god such as how Tiamat's children did so. However, it was more likely than I thought, since Smoughtown's analysis of the Fire Giants reveal that the trolls were once Fire Giants themselves but renounced their god by removing the eye from their stomachs. Why would the dragons rebel against their god? Because of the significance of Tiamat as the mother of monsters in some interpretations. In Smoughtown's video on the dragons, he theorized, and thought it likely, that the beastmen were once taught by the dragons to grow past their primal and instinctual traits, and that over time some have regressed. However, given the context and pattern of the previous gods, and the fact that evolution doesn't really play a part in stuff like this (life doesn't evolve from some primordial soup in these stories, they just exist as designed by the powers that be), this once again went against the natural order of things, as beasts weren't meant to have sapience (an idea of good and evil), only instinct. This dragon god, however, was not only revoked, but it fled. Why would it flee? Because it was the last god to fall, and the god hunt by the godskins and the gloam-eyed queen was likely around at this time, and was possibly around for a while when the first gods fell.

In conclusion to this part of the theory, the Greater Will is the supreme creator in Elden Ring, it created life and the gods, but they fell as a result of their egregious sins. Although there is a loose end to this, that being the Blood Red Star, it is possible that this is just another image the Formless Mother takes, and since there's another tree in the afterlife akin to the Erdtree that gives off this mimicking grace akin to the Greater Will's grace. With this in mind, the Formless Mother may not only the first to fall, but she's possibly the Lucifer of Elden Ring, mimicking the Greater Will and to be like it, seeing the parallels of both creating life from their bodies. However, until more information comes to pass, this is up in the air for now. Next time, I will be talking about the significance of the God Hunts, the Golden Order, and their true significancies in the world of Elden Ring.

To explain my methodology for this Elden Ring theory, here's my following criteria:

But first, Disclaimer: My theory will be heavily based on Smoughtown's research and from his findings from other theorists, along with Ashen Hollow's Gloam-Eyed Queen Marika theory, and various sources of information on mythology that inspired the lore of Elden Ring itself. This theory will also involve heavy speculation but with logical conclusions based on in game events, character psychology, and inspirations for the lore. As for the rules:

Rule Number 1! - The safe assumption that the Greater Will is the creator god of Elden Ring (since it ties heavily into Nordic mythology and its sense of creation).

Rule Number 2! - Greatly distrust the history as written by the Golden Order, given the implications of how deceitful they are.

Rule Number 3! - Go by how the Greater Will's truly designs things for the order of things, not only as stated by word, but by environmental clues and in-game historic events.

Rule Number 4A! - Psychology is as important as physical evidence, study the actions of the characters and how they affected those around them, and keep special focus on if their actions contradict the authority of the Greater Will and how it results.

Rule Number 4B! - DO NOT mistake the Golden Order's authority for the Greater Will's.

Rule Number 5! - The theory will be presented as a timeline, keep in mind not to include something that would contradict how events would transpire.

Rule Number 6! - Have no sides or biases from the start, don't side with Ranni because she's pretty, and don't assume outright that the Greater Will and the Erdtree are parasites.

Rule Number 7! - Don't take my word as absolute, it is subject to change as new information comes forth.

I'll post the first part of my theory soon after Smoughtown comes out with his video on the dragons (the dragons are a critical piece to my theory). I'll see you soon when the time comes.